Blood

"For those who foresee..."

 

Blood

 

Rangan was delighted to put an end to his article when his mobile rang up. Mohini-his mom-called him. She was not well. Again she bled and that was the fifth time after her operation – Hysterectomy due to which her uterus was cut off; this seems to be very much prevalent to the women after the age fifty-five. She had been operated well, and the doctor told she had nothing to worry about bleeding, which appeared to be the common symptom after this kind of operation. It might occur for a month also, but that time as per Mohini she bled profusely. 

 

Scared, he told his mom that he would soon come back from office and would take her to the doctor first; he consoled his timid mom who was restless seeing the blood. That instilled her to think that whether the operation was a successful one.

 

After check-ups, when the doctor said that she was perfectly all right as there was no blood at all, she screamed bitterly in front of all the patients who waited outside the dispensary. She was very much puzzled, as she really had found the blood. Rangan was getting frantic, as he never saw his mom behaving like that. But the doctor never minded after and, instead, he told Rangan to keep her outside, because he needed to talk to Rangan about her, and that was something serious. There remained a nurse to look after her.

 

On being asked whether she had any psychic problems from before, he replied “certainly not.” The doctor prescribed two medicines – one a sleeping capsule and a tension remover. That two were essential for her right now. She had been developing a dysfunctional mental order. The doctor also told Rangan not to worry about that part as patients after the critical operation might have a general tendency to get paranoid and hysteric. She needed proper rest, and hopefully, she would recover soon. Rangan paid that doctor an utterly thank and got a professional welcome too.

 

He could not relate those high-sounding medical nomenclatures - Dysfunctional metal order, paranoid, and hysteria - to his dear mom, Mohini who by nature was a robust lady. She was not a fretful character so far he knew his dear mom. Never in all his life, had he found his mom lying on the bed even if she had a high fever. Why now then? He was very much worried about her, and he shared every little happening – office cultures, concepts of the new articles, boss’s nature, his crush on which female colleague…literally everything. But from now on he had to instigate on his mom like a perfect neurologist. He never knew which incident might become a drastic co-incidence to her.

 

The day Mohini was admitted to the nursing home, she was sad very much about her son. She told Rangan’s dad to look him after properly as he could not stay alone. Rangan felt ashamed very much by her remark as if he was little kid, not a twenty six year old person. As if, she had been departing for a long voyage. Rangan not only looked after his dad, but also took care of every household matter like a perfect domestic engineer; at the same time he worked attentively in the office. He did not get fainted after his all-time-angry boss patted him on his shoulder in front of all the other employees for writing such ‘superb’ film reviews. “Great job, young man, keep it up”, boss said to him. He got his first adult assignment, and he completed that with the distinction marks staying reluctant to the ups-and-downs to his personal life.

 

She had been operated well and came back home. He took special care of her: he laughed louder; he talked much; he brought good Bengali novels for her; he even cooked on Sundays; and he told her that he finally proposed his beloved colleague, Resmi. Most of what he did was just to divert her attention to the normal thinking.

 

He understood a kind of artificialness in his behavior, but he could not help it; he had to keep her right, by any means.

 

Mohini passed her off-time by reading the Bengali books and by watching news and films on the Television. Sometimes, she had been weaving a woolen sweater for Rangan and thinking about her time at nursing home. There was a ‘bandh’ (strike) by the Bengal Bus Syndicate for hiking the transportation fares the day before the day she was going to be operated; she was tensed that day very much for Rangan as he was supposed come at the nursing home…again she gave attention to the weaving. She had to complete it before winter came.

 

The other day Rangan had been writing an article on a totally new concept: Transliminality, a tendency for information to surface from a subconscious mind. It is a Para Psychological term. He quite liked this topic and did an acute research and wrote a good article with an added views coined by the psychologists believing in such idea.

 

Back home, Mohini made him sit by her and told him she had a terrible dream today when she slept in the noontime. That was not a new thing to Rangan as he used to hear her dreams like a good listener; he quite enjoyed hearing them while terming each of them, “A surrealistic promo”, “An undefined documentary”, and so on. And both of them shared a hearty laugh this way. In her dream, she was not alone; Rangan was there too at his little age with her, and she tried her best to get rid of her hallucinated jigsaws, and at last she found a way out. He never grew up in her dream.

 

*                   *                       *

 

But this time she was alone…

 

She was being given blood, and suddenly a feverish chill struck her. Doctor said, after examining her, she needed the fresh blood. The current one was 15 days old due to which she had a fever. So, they had to wait until her son came. But how come would that be possible? There was a vehicles-strike that day. Momentarily, they were away from there, with no solutions unturned. She also found it miserable to lie there. Irritated, she started faint walking and had found a large corridor with big floor-touched windows at which other female patients had gathered. They were all seeing something happening outside. She asked someone but got no answer at all. She heard a sound, which she was familiar with while she used to enter the fish market. She proceeded slowly and at last had a place where no one was actually there. What did she see?

 

A person holding a big chopper was walking. Suddenly his gaze met with hers; by look that person seemed a sort of a priest. He had a long beard and he was masculine. “We want blood…human blood,” he said to her. She replied to him, “same here, I also need fresh blood, A positive”. So many persons were gathering there. Was it a kind of ritual? What was going on? She thought. At the same time, she thought about Rangan; how could he come? He could barely get any vehicle today. So many danger factors waiting outside might cause harm to him.

 

Suddenly, she found one person, totally drenched in the water, was being taken by two other persons. The taken one was flogged mercilessly. His screaming sound filled the air; no one actually had come to help that fellow. Where had he been taken?

 

Now, he was forcefully laid on the floor, and that blood seeker one started running keeping the long sword high on his head, and he had come at last to the place he was put down deliberately; he butchered him. Mohini was dumbfounded. The people had started dancing in a jubilant manner on a murderous rhythm. Dancing was that head-less body too, for the remaining life stayed therein, and the head sprung like a football shot at here and there.

 

She felt a massive illness and started finding the room she had actually come from, but she could not find hers. Suddenly she found a nurse who had been taking good care of her ever since she had been admitted there. She requested her to take her to her cabin. She cross-questioned her rather: Why was she there? She was supposed to stay in the room. That time Mohini requested her helplessly to show her the way.

 

Mohini had been instructed to go straight. She told that nurse what she had encountered. It seemed to her that the nurse was very well aware of the incident. It appeared to Mohini that this recurring ritual took place earlier also. She changed the subject by asking her whether Rangan had arrived or not. He was supposed to bring the fresh blood. She answered there was so much fresh blood outside.

 

“Just go and fetch the blood. It could be A positive”, she said to her.

 Now, there was a surprise for the nurse to burst out, “W-H-A-T?”

 

She entered a big dormitory with so many beds. She found a person who lied on a cornered bed. Two other persons stood there. She proceeded to find one uniformed person we giving blood. He seemed to be in a security service; she could not recognize him from a distance. One of the standing ones told her, “He is giving blood for you. You see today is a strike and we can’t take any risk; your son might not come. By tomorrow itself your hemoglobin level must be normal, because tomorrow is your operation.

 

She leaned ahead to find that the person giving blood had no head. “Rafiq Ahmed” was the name of the person. His name was known from the batch over his left shirt-pocket. She remembered one smiling face of the security section greeted her the time she got released from this nursing home. He was none other than Rafiq, a jovial person. She was certain she was going to faint. She found herself falling on the ground…falling, falling…

 

*                  *                     *

 

Both the mother and the son were silent. That stupendous story snatched every single word from them. Now, he spoke out, “Blood Seekers Paradise”, and he burst out in laughter. Mohini looked at him cautiously. Then she also started laughing with him.

 

She got feverish when she was given the old blood. Rafiq did a nice job in giving blood to her, since he was the universal donor.

 

Mohini assured Rangan that he had nothing to worry about her. Her dream was nothing but what she encountered in reality. She had seen in the TV, the terrorists in the Jammu and Kashmir region captured one press photographer and later his headless body was found in a field. Perhaps all that she had seen in her dream was the mere relation to what she saw in the news channel.

 

But Rangan had nothing to be happy after his mom’s analytical clarification of that delusion. She started requesting Rangan to get the information about Rafiq, who was hero in his mother’s eyes; he got enrolled in her good book.

 

However, Rangan was satisfied at least to find his mom was out of her recent trauma.

 

After Four Days

 

Rangan did not at all get any time within next four days to go and get the information of Rafiq who saved his mom’s life. That day he was firm that he must go the nursing home, since he did not know his address. When he entered the nursing home another aged security person who also did the shifting duty, smiled to him. He smiled back

 

Now, the time had come for Rangan for the genuine puzzlement. When he asked about Rafiq, he got a devastating reply from him: Rafiq faced one accident on the high road near the nursing home; when he was crossing the road, one truck crashed over him. He was taken in this nursing and found spot dead. It all happened just 4 days ago.

 

Rangan found nothing to spell; just four days ago Mohini saw the dream. He was bewildered and aghast. He could not find any solution to this paradoxical nexus. How could that be possible?

 

“Some psychologists think that people, who believe that they have the paranormal powers such as telepathy, the capacity to foretell the future or the other forms of the Extra Sensory Perception (ESP) might be accessing information in their subconscious without actually realizing it. Pundits call this action as the transliminal encounter and the persons, happening to foresee, are the prey of transliminality, off course.” He wrote a sequel to that earlier topic. He thought it was inevitable to let his readers know about this unknown concept, so that they also could make provision when any such incident hit them.

 

What about the earlier dreams that she had seen she had been trapped in a jigsaw puzzle? Every time Rangan was with her to give her a company while the present hallucination had no one to help her. And that metamorphosed into an unpleasant reality.

 

He could not tell her about Rafiq’s death. He was scared truth might harm her, and it was foolish to lose his dear mom for an already dead person. A white lie was there that Rafiq was OK just to save her from the unconscious injury.

 

Would it be because Rangan could not give much time to his ailing mother, that she did not find him in her dream, a foretold reality? - He thought.

 

That day when Rangan had come back from office, Mohini said she had seen another dream, that time Rangan seemed irritated and curious at the same time. She saw that Rangan had brought pomegranate for her.

 

This time too, he got amazed. Really he thought of buying pomegranate for her, but somehow he could not, as he was already late to home. He then thought to buy that next day. But he was happy. Mohini’s dreamy predictability started losing its prompt impact.

 

“Oh, sorry I will bring that tomorrow”, he said to her. He suddenly embraced her tightly, saying, “I will always be with you everywhere, in your dream also.”

 

Mohini was surprised by this sudden outburst; she replied, “I know that, sweetheart!”

Reviews

[emmajoy]

My goodness, what a long, long story and so full of detail, sad and otherwise.

It's an intriguing story and, it captures the reader, BUT I wonder if it has a little too much detail, especially in the first and second paragraphs.

Having said that you use wonderful vocabulary, the medical wording is extraordinary, and your sentences are formed well

The mother's mental deterioration is sensitively described, and, the dream sequences are truly fine.

Whereas your ideas, varied that they are, are very good, this post needs to be trimmed down, some of it is repetitive, maybe?

Thank you so much for sharing.

[Belator Books]

Not bad. Your command of English is quite impressive. Your grasp of imagery is real and unforced. Keep up the pen.

[Nicole (Carpe Diem)]

the story is good... i might cut it down a little - agreeing with Emma... take out some of the details...so not to overwhelm the reader in the beginning of the story....